Her Fearless Love_Seeing Ranch Mail Order Bride

by Florence Linnington

“Margaret!” her husband shouted again. Several people nearby paused in their conversation to glance over their shoulders at him.

  Mrs. Hawkins ducked her face. “It was nice to meet you, Miss Potter,” she mumbled, as she hurried past.

  “You, too,” Bonnie answered, but the other woman was already joining her husband at the far end of the lawn. Together, they set off down the road.

  “Well,” Mrs. Briggs’ said in a cheery voice. “We really are glad to have you here.”

  “Thank you,” Bonnie answered, unable to resist glancing at the Hawkins’ one more time. They walked close together, Mrs. Hawkins’ shoulders slumped and her head hanging down.

  “I live right up the hill,” Mrs. Briggs’ was saying. “And I would love for you to call on me sometime. Or perhaps I might visit you.”

  “That would be nice,” Bonnie answered.

  They talked for a few minutes more, Mrs. Briggs telling Bonnie how her husband ran the hotel and how she had come to Whiteridge the year prior. The whole time, Bonnie could not shake her thoughts of Mrs. Hawkins. Why had her husband yelled at her so? She had only been speaking with a couple people. It was the same thing everyone else at church had been doing!

  “Is she all right?” Bonnie asked, once Mrs. Briggs paused in asking Bonnie questions about her new cabin.

  “Margaret?” Mrs. Briggs’ lips pursed. “Yes. She is fine.”

  The look on the woman’s face did not match the words coming from her mouth. But Bonnie did not have time to question them. Steve was walking their way, though, and most of the other churchgoers had already departed. It was time to go.

  “Go north up the road and take a left on the first turn-off,” Mrs. Briggs said, setting her wiggly baby on the grass, where the little girl promptly began attempting to stand. “I would love for you to stop by sometime.”

  “I will do that,” Bonnie promised. “Perhaps I can find time this week.”

  Slipping her arm through Steve’s, Bonnie walked with him in the direction of their cabin.

  “How did you enjoy your first day of church in Whiteridge?” he asked.

  “It was, um...” Bonnie could not finish the sentence. All she could think of was Mrs. Hawkins and the way her husband had spoken to her. And she had not even been doing anything wrong—only conversing with some people.

  “It was nice,” Bonnie finished lamely.

  She felt Steve’s eyes on her, but she did not dare look directly at him. If Mrs. Hawkins’ did have an unkind husband, there wasn’t much Bonnie could do about it.

  At the very least, she could offer the woman friendship. And she could also thank God for giving her her own husband who—so far—had been nothing but kind.

  4

  4. Bonnie

  Chapter four

  The first couple of days Bonnie had trouble finding her way around the kitchen nook in the cabin. She’d kept thinking she was back at her room in the boarding house, with nothing but a corner cabinet and a slim table for two in the corner.

  Now almost a week into her new life, she moved effortlessly about her new home as she prepared Sunday dinner, dicing and stirring. Steve sat at the kitchen table, a cup of coffee in his hand, legs stretched out toward the open door. He’d been watching her cook since they’d arrived home, and Bonnie found she did not mind it at all.

  “What do you think?” Steve asked between sips. “Doesn’t this feel like home?”

  “It does,” Bonnie laughed, spooning the last bits of broth over the chicken breast. They had no chickens of their own, but Chandler Mullins, the general store owner, had brought them a butchered one the day before as a welcoming gift to Bonnie. He’d also promised them some chicks from the next flock to hatch if they wanted them.

  In such a short amount of time, things were coming together in Whiteridge. For Bonnie and Steve, anyway. Not two hours had passed since the incident outside of the church, and Bonnie still found it hard to get Mrs. Hawkins off her mind. The woman had come to Whiteridge as a mail-order bride, and, with a toss of dice, had found herself with her husband.

  Bonnie believed Steve to be a good man. What bothered her was the fate of the other woman—a fate that could so easily have been handed to Bonnie instead.

  With the meal finished, she set the plates and serving dishes on the table and took her seat. Steve straightened up and clasped his hands to pray.

  “Dear God,” he began, “thank you for this meal and for all the other blessings in our lives. Most of all, thank you for this opportunity for the two of us to begin a life together. Amen.”

  On the last word, he opened his eyes and looked at Bonnie across the table.

  “Amen,” she repeated, smiling at him.

  They were quiet for a moment as they tucked into their meal, the noise of silverware scraping the only sound.

  “About our wedding,” Steve began breaking the silence.

  Bonnie looked up from her plate, waiting for him to go on.

  “I heard today the reverend will be here in two weeks. If that works for you, we can have him marry us that day.”

  “Two weeks?” Bonnie repeated. “Won’t it be rather cold then?”

  Steve shrugged. He had been sleeping out in the yard, which had worked out well so far, on account of the mild weather, but Bonnie had heard the cold season could come on fast and strong in Wyoming.

  “I do not like the thought of you sleeping out there,” she said.

  Steve twisted his lips and didn’t answer. There was only one bed in the cabin, the large one across from the kitchen area, and they would not share that until they married.

  “I can hang a sheet up,” Bonnie said. “Across the room. That way, you will have your own private space.”

  Steve shook his head. “I don’t want you to go through that trouble for me.”

  “Trouble for my husband? What I do for him, I’d do for myself.”

  Steve’s lips twitched upward at that. “All right. Hang the sheet. I can borrow some horse blankets to make myself a bed on the floor.”

  “Good,” Bonnie said in satisfaction and returned to her meal.

  “We’re getting married.” Steve guffawed. “I can’t believe it.”

  Bonnie joined him with her own giggles. “I actually cannot as well.”

  He looked at her straight on, and his attention felt like a blanket of warmth being laid on Bonnie’s shoulders. Yes, she could get used to this.

  “I’m glad you’re here,” Steve said, his voice low.

  Bonnie swallowed, her heart racing. “I am, as well.”

  She knew her first few days in the area might have been particularly good ones, and that hard times could still be ahead, but Bonnie wanted to remain as positive as she possibly could. It would be strange living in the West, especially without her father’s library and the university’s library close by, but she was adapting. She had brought a few of her father’s novels with her, and she hoped that providence would bring her some more books at some point.

  At any rate, moving West meant she had embarked on a marvelous adventure, much like the kind you would find in any exciting novel. And there had been a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow as well: a kind and handsome husband.

  “Tell me about your childhood,” Bonnie said, taking a bite of the chicken.

  “Aw, now, what do you want to hear about? The good boy Steve or...”

  “The bad boy Steve, most certainly.”

  He chuckled. “All right, let’s see… I grew up with two brothers and a sister. I was the youngest by four years. I don’t think my folks had planned to have me at all, but there I was. We lived outside of a town about, oh, thirty miles from New York, called Melina.”

  “What was it like being the youngest?”

  “My mother doted on me.”

  “I imagine so,” Bonnie said.

  “And my siblings didn’t like that.” Steve chuckled at something. “Boy, I could be spoiled.”

  Bonnie cocked her head. “I cannot see that. The
re is nothing entitled about you now.”

  “Well, this was a long time ago, before I got some sense kicked into me.”

  “Do tell.” Bonnie set her chin in her hand, her eyes going wide.

  “Are you sure this won’t change your opinion of me?”

  “I cannot make any promises.”

  “Ouch.” Steve pretended to wince in pain.

  “Oh, tell me!” Bonnie cried. “Do not be that way.”

  “All right, all right. So… In addition to being a mother’s boy, I was also a teacher’s pet.”

  “But of course,” Bonnie said.

  “One day, when I was, let’s see… not yet ten, I walked to school with my older brothers, Steph and Jodie. They were always giving me a hard time, saying I was constantly trying to get on the teacher’s good side.”

  “And were you?”

  “Well...” Steve looked away with a grin.

  “That is all I need to know. So what happened on this particular day?”

  “I’d brought this little apple pie with me. My ma had baked the day before, and she let me make my own pie for the teacher in this little tin dish. I suppose you can imagine the names my brothers called me.”

  “Children can be awfully cruel. Especially siblings.”

  “Nah, the names those two have called me have never much gotten to me. However, what they did that day did.”

  Bonnie held her breath, nodding for him to go on.

  “I didn’t know this, but they’d switched my little apple pie out with one made with worms.”

  “What?” Bonnie cried, covering her mouth with her hands. “That is… goodness...” She shook her head in disgust.

  “In case you’re wondering...”

  “Your teacher did not eat the pie, did she?”

  “She cut into it, but that’s as far as it went before she noticed something wasn’t quite right.”

  “Was she angry?”

  “Naw,” Steve said. “She knew right away it was my brothers playing a prank.”

  Bonnie folded her arms on the table, still intently watching him. While he’d told the story from his childhood, he lit up. She wanted to see more of him in that state.

  “And what about after that?” Bonnie asked. “Were you still the teacher’s pet?”

  “I might have reined it in a little bit.”

  “Ah! So your brothers got their way.”

  “That’s what they would like to think.”

  Bonnie laughed and took a sip of water. A cool breeze entered through the open doorway, and she noticed that the leaves of the cottonwoods were more orange than they’d been the day before.

  “I have heard winter can appear here quite swiftly,” she said.

  Steve nodded. “That’s right. It can last longer than back east, too. The winter before I came here, apparently there was a blizzard in April.”

  Bonnie shuddered at the very thought.

  “Don’t worry,” Steve said, noticing her unease. “We’ll prepare for it. The cabin needs to be chinked, and I’ll stack the rest of the firewood up against the outer walls. That’ll do some good. You ever chinked a cabin before?”

  Surely, he was joking. “No,” she said.

  “It won’t be a fancy job. We’ll just be mixing up some mud and putting it in the cracks between the logs. It’ll do a fine job, though.”

  “Good,” Bonnie murmured, feeling better already. Steve had a way of calming her nerves, of making her feel everything would be all right.

  For the first time, she realized she could not wait for their wedding. Soon, she would be walking through Whiteridge as his proud wife. And then, in the evenings, they would have each others’ company to keep them happy and warm.

  “A penny for your thoughts?” Steve said.

  “Hmm?”

  “You were smiling about something.”

  Bonnie toyed with her fork and gave him a mischievous grin simply for the heck of it. “Was I?”

  “Yes. You were.”

  He wore a serious look, but Bonnie could see the delight flickering in his eyes.

  “Well, now I suppose you would love to know what it was,” she teased.

  His mouth twitched in the hint of a smile. He was doing his best to keep his poker face on but failing.

  “Tell me,” Steve said evenly.

  Bonnie waved her fork through the air. “Perhaps I will, and perhaps I won’t.”

  “Tell me,” Steve repeated.

  Bonnie shrugged.

  In the blink of an eye, he stood, rounded the table, and lowered himself so the two of them were eye to eye. Bonnie gasped in surprise, her fork clattering onto the table. Steve’s exhale washed across her face. It was the closest they’d ever been, and though they weren’t touching, Bonnie’s hands trembled and her heart raced.

  “Tell me.”

  Bonnie gulped. “I was…” She paused, struggling for breath. “Thinking about how nice it will be to be married to you.”

  As the words left her lips, heat flowed into her face. Of course, they both knew they were to be married. That was the whole reason she had answered the ad and come to Wyoming.

  But putting it the way she had, implying that she wanted to marry Steve in a way that was not simply for practical purposes but was personal… that was something entirely different.

  Steve blinked and licked his lips. “Really?”

  “Yes,” Bonnie whispered.

  “I am going to kiss you now.”

  She sucked in a breath. Up till then, the most they’d touched was when they’d linked arms, and even that was done in the lightest and most respectable way. Now, as Steve pressed his lips to hers, a dizzying warmth overcame Bonnie. It was like being submerged in a natural hot spring.

  Drawing back, Steve went and took his seat. “Still thinking of me?”

  Again, Bonnie blushed. “A little,” she answered coyly.

  5

  5. Steve

  Chapter five

  Steve relaxed against the warm rock face, letting his limbs grow heavy as he closed his eyes and absorbed the afternoon sun’s warmth. Next to him, Neil whistled a tune that sounded oddly familiar.

  “What’s that tune?” Steve asked, cracking an eyelid.

  In the middle of unpacking his lunch, Neil shrugged. “Something I heard while ranching. About an Irish girl, I think.” Neil bit into an apple. “Huh, a pretty little Irish girl. Think of it. Red hair, green eyes. You know what they call pretty lasses over there, don’t you?”

  Steve good-naturedly knocked his boot against Neil’s. “I know.”

  “Bonny. They say there’s a ‘bonny lass.’” Neil shook his apple in the air as he impersonated an Irish accent.

  “Do they now?”

  “They do.” At the sight of Steve’s face, Neil snorted. “Hey, now. Don’t you be playing games with me.”

  Steve chuckled. “I would never.”

  Opening up his tin pail, Steve unpacked the venison sandwich and boiled egg Bonnie had carefully packed for him. She’d even put in a twist of paper with salt and pepper in it, for sprinkling on the egg.

  “How is it at home?” Neil asked, eyes wide as he crunched on his apple.

  Steve didn’t even have to think about his answer. “Better than I ever thought it could be.”

  “And the wedding? When is that?”

  “It won’t exactly be a wedding, but I’d like you to be our witness, if you would.”

  Neil pressed his hand against his heart in an exaggerated show of emotion. “By Jove, old boy, I’d be proud to!”

  “I was hoping you’d say something like that.”

  “By Jove?”

  Steve shook his head as he smiled. Neil was always joshing, but it was a welcome blessing. There was nothing pleasant about working in a mine all day long, and Steve would take any distraction that came his way.

  Tucking into their lunches, they sat quietly in the grass, listening to the breeze in the trees and the chatter coming from the direction of
the mine. Most of the workers took their lunches into the clearing in front of the mine, but Steve and Neil had found this special spot near the creek months ago, and now came to it every day.